Category Archives: consumers

Supermarkets in China (and where not) have been unfriendly for innovation – to put it mildly. But Alibaba’s HEMA’s supermarkets, starting the so-called “new retail”, are causing a revolution, writes marketing guru Tom Doctoroff in AdAge. 25 Stores are functional and dozens more will be open soon.

China has become a politicized society, and countries and businesses can only ignore politics at their own peril. That is one of the key messages of political analyst Shaun Rein’s book The War for China’s Wallet: Profiting from the New World Order, and at the China Economic Review, he explains how that – in his view – works.

Box office revenue for Star Wars: The Last Jedi, was beaten by a local romantic movie, showing US movies do not automatically win in China. US classics to not have the following in China, they have at home, says business analyst Ben Cavender to CNBC.

Deep insight in consumer behaviour is what marketing should offer, writes branding guru Tom Doctoroff, author of What Chinese Want: Culture, Communism, and China’s Modern Consumer, on his LinkedIn page. Cluttering that insight with “exaggerated faith in algorithms, programmatic efficacy and hyper-personalization,” is not helpful he adds. And: “Insights are not observations.”

Stability and tradition in China are much stronger over the generations than many outsiders assume, marketing guru Tom Doctoroff, author of What Chinese Want: Culture, Communism, and China’s Modern Consumer, argues in this video clip for Amcham. Tensions between generations do exist in China too, but they are different from those elsewhere in the world, he argues.

E-commerce giant Alibaba launched this week a special app for the older people at Taobao, its online shopping website. A logical step, says retail analyst Ben Cavender to Reuters. “It’s easier now than it was in the past to get some of these older users to actually open up their wallets and spend.”

No tool has changed life in China more than the smartphone, with 640 million users and counting in less than a decade. But a new device is possibly disrupting – and improving – life even more, writes Shanghai-based lawyer Mark Schaub in the China Law Insight: the self-driving car. He paints the upcoming changes, and the way China’s government is promoting that change.

Chinese brands like Huawei and Xiaomi have not only legal problems to enter the lucrative US market, says business analyst Shaun Rein, author of The War for China’s Wallet: Profiting from the New World Order. It would also help if potential buyers would be able to pronounce the name of the product they are expected to purchase, he tells the South China Morning Post.

While many movie watchers even get fussy feelings when they hear the words “Star War”, China is lacking such a cult following, explains branding expert Ben Cavender to CNBC. Movies that would be a hit elsewhere in the world, are just not working in China, he says.

Bike-sharing firms like Mobike and Ofo might work out, explains Jeffrey Towson, investment professor at the Peking University. “It is unusual but not crazy,” he tells about the pervasive marketing strategy of bike-sharing. Independent assets moving around might just be the new thing.